Would you come here if you saw an empty case of Budweiser, a bunch of empty beer cans, filthy paper plates, half-eaten bags of potato chips and cruddy plastic bags littering the green grass where you wanted to picnic?

Would you go for a swim on a beach dotted with watermelon rinds, cigarette butts and parts of plastic toys — in water where plastic cups and more parts of plastic toys are floating?

And if you had to drive on a road that seems to be growing garbage to get to that picnic spot, would you even bother to try and get there?

Didn't think so.

But that's what I found early Monday after the July Fourth weekend at one of the region's most beautiful spots — Lake Superior State Park in Bethel in Sullivan County. I stress that was before the crew that cleans it did a fabulous job picking up the garbage, manicuring the lawn and beach and making Lake Superior look immaculate once again.

So please, dear visitors, don't make our home filthy.

But it isn't just Lake Superior that's getting trashed this summer.

The roads we all complain about each spring — Routes 17, 17B and 209 to start, in Orange, Ulster and Sullivan counties — look filthier than ever. I don't want to assume that's from all the extra people but "»

And another one of our gems — the pristine park on the shore of Swan Lake that Nancy Levine and a slew of volunteers built — was littered with food wrappers and plastic bottles the other day, by folks who had just enjoyed it — until Levine cleaned it up.

So I ask all of you summer visitors — whose business and money we surely appreciate — would you want us to come to your home, to your street, to your neighborhood and leave an empty case of Bud, a bunch of beer cans, some half-eaten potato chip bags where you live?

Didn't think so.

We've only got about six weeks of summer to go.

So here's my gentle suggestion.

If you have trash after you're done picnicking, camping, hiking or swimming, please just put it in a trash container. If the containers are full, or there aren't any, please don't leave your trash on the grass, beach or in the woods — or throw it by the side of the road.

Just take it with you and toss it in the garbage when you get to wherever you're staying for the summer.

This may be our home all year long, but for now it's yours, too.

Let's keep our home so neat and clean, we all want to live here — together